Han
by blacktop
Summary: Through the playful intervention of Reese's old friend Mr. Han, a seething Detective Fusco gathers valuable new insight into Reese's relationship with Carter - and learns something about himself as well.


**Han**

Fusco knew the setup of chess and checkers and this didn't look like either one of those familiar games.

As he approached the corner of the park where Reese sat opposite an old Chinese man, the detective tried to figure out what exactly they were doing. He could see they were talking, with more animation than he had ever seen from Reese. They were moving round wooden pieces across a series of light and dark squares etched in the cement table between them.

And they were smiling.

Fusco wanted to throttle Reese where he sat.

Of course it wasn't Reese's fault, exactly, that the lives of two Child Protective Services officers had been endangered in the shoot-out of the previous night. True, Finch had warned the agency staff that the presumptive mother was not who she said she was; that the child at issue was not actually a child at all. But still, when knives were drawn and guns fired, it had been Fusco who had to hustle the scared staffers to safety.

After the dwarf bit a good sized chunk out of his arm.

Naturally, Reese slipped away from the scene as soon as the gunfire stopped. The last image Fusco retained of that night was of Carter. He saw her moving slowly through the apartment, left hand gripping the perp's neck as she marched him to the door. With a handkerchief in her right hand, she wiped from the tables and countertops any fingerprints that might incriminate Reese.

What a piece of work.

Now Reese and his little Chinese friend were sitting in the steamy summer sun, in open neck short-sleeved shirts, enjoying a leisurely afternoon in the park without the slightest care in the world.

Reese wore a light weight shirt in pale gray and the old man's was off-white. Both cool as cucumbers in the plus eighty degree heat, while sweat made his own itchy dark shirt cling to his back and chest.

The stands of dusty old trees on either side of their table made it look like they were in some kind of silent movie that he was only watching. The light flickering across their table in mottled splashes of sun and shade increased that impression of artificiality and isolation.

Here was Reese sitting as cool as Superman in the fucking Fortress of Solitude while Carter sweated out another report in the precinct house where the air conditioner was on the fritz for the second time this month.

The more Fusco thought about Carter and that report the more steamed he got. He assumed she was still punching out an account that was doomed to be barely plausible at best. Her writing was much better than his so he happily left that kind of work to her. And anyway, he figured she had more motivation than he did for giving the report a convincing and favorable twist. Sure, he had left her holding the bag, but it was Reese who set them up in the first place.

Maybe it was guilt or something like it that prompted Fusco's switch in plans. After a 10 o'clock doctor's appointment to have the three inch bite wound on his forearm re-bandaged, Fusco had decided to take the rest of the day off.

As he left the precinct he had mumbled something to Carter about a headache, but didn't fill in the details of exactly where he planned to go. The idea wasn't even fully formed in his mind as he headed off to the clinic.

The plan began as just a vague desire bubbling inside his skull to meet up with Reese and settle the score somehow. Several times in the last few months Fusco had followed Reese to this dry little park on the edge of Chinatown. So it had made sense to check here in his rambling pursuit of the man who was currently at the top of his chaps-my-khakis list.

Fusco approached Reese from the right, walking quietly, but with no attempt to hide his movements. The gravel crunched like peanut shells under his feet and he saw Reese's companion straighten his back at the sound.

Trudging toward the far perimeter of the park, Fusco felt the combination of blistering heat and the pulsing sting of the bite on his arm roll to a boil inside him.

He fumed over Reese's sweet set up: one detective to do his dirty work, and another to get his rocks off with. As Fusco figured it, he and Carter got left with the butt end of that deal, anyway you looked at it.

By the time he had crossed the rock-strewn lot to the game tables, Fusco was seething.

Twenty yards away from his quarry, he picked up a metal chair leaning against another concrete table and carried it with him to Reese's side. He unfolded the chair and banged it down next to Reese, so close that when he sat their shoulders were almost touching.

"Afternoon, Lionel. Good to see you again."

Reese didn't turn his head. His bland tone suggested nothing so much as a reunion of two bowling buddies who had spent the previous weekend burning up the local alley.

Fusco refused to say a word. No reason to release the wrath too early.

Reese said something to the old man in Chinese and then spoke to him again in English.

"Han, this is my friend, Lionel. Lionel, this is Mr. Han."

"Pleased to meet you, Mr. Lionel. I have heard much about you."

The man was blind and Fusco wondered why he didn't even bother to wear dark glasses to cover his pupils. They were as pale and opaque and creepy as the whites of a fried egg.

Blindness notwithstanding, Han extended his right hand to exactly the point in mid-air that met Fusco's half way.

"How did he do that?" Fusco's whispered question was directed to Reese, who replied in full voice:

"Although he is my friend, Han, he is also rude, so you must excuse him."

Han's face split into a radiant grin. "Imagine that, a rude New York City policeman!"

"How does he know I'm police?"

"As I said, John has spoken about you, so I know your occupation."

Han placed his wooden piece on the board and leaned back in his seat. The man's wide forehead, with the skin stretch smoothly across its expanse, reminded Fusco of the color of the ivory keys on his grandmother's old upright piano.

"I also know that you are overweight, that you have injured your arm, and that you are annoyed with John today."

"How does he… How do _you_ know all that? You just met me." Fusco was impressed right out of his previous sullenness.

"I noticed that you were panting slightly when you came to our table, so I concluded that you were out of shape. When we shook hands, I noted the extra pad of fat over the tendons on the back of your hand. And when I gripped your hand, you pulled back a bit as if wincing. I concluded that you had hurt your right hand or arm.

"And of course, the fact that you did not greet John when you sat down indicated that you were annoyed with him."

"Yeah, I see. Just a lucky guess." Fusco was not about to give in so easily to a parlor trick or a set up by Reese.

Reese's voice cooled a degree or two and he turned his shoulders to look the detective in the eye.

"What do you want, Lionel? Why did you follow me here on my day off?"

Fusco shifted in his seat and heard the rickety chair creak under his weight.

"Yeah, well, I took the day off too, Reese. On accounta needing to visit the doctor and all." He raised his arm and pushed the blue shirt sleeve above his elbow to reveal the large gauze pad and bandages that covered his wound.

"Where is Detective Carter?"

Fusco wasn't amused that Reese turned the conversation in that direction. The man always managed to bring her into it somehow whether she belonged there or not.

"Whadda ya think? She's at her desk, where she is supposed to be. Like all good cops are on the day after a big take down, writing a goddam report."

"So she's a good cop? What does that make you, Lionel?"

"Very. Funny. I do what I'm told and keep my nose out of other people's business, that's what kind of cop I am, wise guy."

To Fusco's surprise, the Chinese man piped up at this point.

"John, is that the Detective Carter that you call Joss?"

"Yes."

Reese said this with a crispness that Fusco recognized. They were getting into dangerous territory and he was happy to push past the borderline.

He spoke loudly to the old man.

"So, Mr. Han. Have you met my partner Detective Carter?"

"Yes, John brought her here once and introduced us. A very beautiful lady."

Han nodded and turned his fish-belly white eyes toward Fusco, the challenge mild but evident.

Fusco figured there was no way this blind joker could know what Carter looked like.

More importantly, he could sense that Reese was growing uncomfortable with the personal turn in the conversation.

Time to needle Secret Agent Man some more.

"O.K., I'll bite, Han. How do you know Carter is beautiful? Cause I'm gonna go along with you. She is definitely good-looking. But unless you got a lot closer to her than I figure Reese here would allow, I don't see how you know what she looks like."

"Always a skeptic, Mr. Lionel." Han placed both hands on the cement table palms down and leaned toward Fusco.

"The technique is simple. One that I believe your famous blues singer Ray Charles perfected. A lady's hand reveals much about her. I can tell whether she takes care of her personal appearance from the state of her nails. I can tell what kind of work she does from the position of calluses on her palms and fingers. And I can tell the symmetry and general outline of her form by the corresponding shape of her hand.

"A lovely hand is attached to a lovely woman."

Han paused to wait for an objection from either man.

Fusco smiled in encouragement until he realized that the blind man wouldn't be able to receive the silent signal.

"So that's how you knew that Carter was beautiful? By shaking her hand?"

"Yes, Mr. Lionel. That's how I knew."

Reese peered intently at the old man.

Fusco didn't see why he bothered with that whole burning-a-hole-into-your-head-with-those-special-eyes trick, since obviously it wasn't going to work on this guy.

Maybe Reese was trying ESP.

Han leaned back in his chair, folded both hands across his stomach, and continued his explanation.

"That. And John told me."

Fusco marveled as Han turned his milky eyes on Reese, staring straight through him as if defying him to put a stop to the story. Reese said nothing, so the old man continued.

"One day, about seven months ago, John told me he had met a woman who was both smart and kind. He said he wanted me to meet her. I said I could only _see_ her if she was also beautiful. Sort of a blind man's joke, you know."

Han laughed with gusto. Fusco noticed Reese close his eyes and hunch his shoulders.

"He assured me she was beautiful. And he promised to bring her here the next time they had a free evening."

Fusco was extremely satisfied to watch two delicate spots of red bloom high on Reese's cheeks as Han expanded his account.

"I have known John for many years. But this was the first time he introduced me to anyone. So you can understand that this was indeed an auspicious occasion. We had a brief but warm talk that evening. I was highly honored to meet Detective Carter."

Fusco wanted the old man to say something further. He wanted to find out more about the match between his partner and Reese.

But the opportunity had slipped away.

Han picked up a pale wooden playing piece and moved it to a new location on the board.

Reese quickly moved his own dark piece and shoved a marker of the opposite color from the field.

Han pursed his lips for a moment.

"A wise move, John. Well played."

Fusco thought he must be visualizing the board and all the possible moves awaiting his decision.

Suddenly, the old man swept his hand over the cement field. Several pieces seemed to shift at once, although Fusco thought that couldn't actually be a legitimate move.

When Han finished rearranging the pieces, Fusco realized that the mysterious game had ended. The board was set for a new match.

Reese leaned across the table and took Han's fingers. He clasped the old man's hand in both of his own and squeezed tightly. When the sleeve rode up on his left arm, Fusco could see that Han's bicep was pocked with three round puckered scars.

Bullet wounds, healed up perhaps a decade ago.

Their arms suspended over the table, the two friends gently ran their thumbs over the knuckles of each other's hands for a moment and then separated.

So someone, maybe a few someones, did matter to Reese.

In the cooling wash of this revelation, Fusco felt the simmering in his mind begin to subside.

Nodding to Fusco, Reese pushed his chair away from the table and began walking toward the subway entrance at the north end of the park.

Fusco stood so abruptly his chair tipped over. He said a brief good-bye to Han, promising to give his greetings to Detective Carter and to come back to the park for another visit someday soon.

When he turned to follow Reese, the younger man was out of sight.

Fusco walked slowly toward the subway entrance. As he plunged into the station, a welcome wave of cool air rolled out of its dark mouth to envelope him.

He felt refreshed, relieved somehow.

He didn't expect to catch up with this strange, elusive man this afternoon, or even this week. But he would keep trying. That was all he knew how to do.

And he was good at it.


End file.
